Bear Mountain Bull

From Frank Barbera tonight at Financial Sense:

While we would love to try and see the ‘silver lining’ in today’s economy, at the moment, it is very hard to see which sectors of the economy are going to lead the US out of the current economic malaise. A close examination of any number of economic reports shows that without the help of government spending, most of the data ex-Uncle Sam is still scraping along the bottom or in decline. While it is true that in the past employment has been a lagging indicator, it is also true that going forward it is hard to see where new employment will come from on a scale needed to turn a global contraction back into global growth. In addition, President Obama’s “Cap and Trade” Bill looms as a giant new energy tax, something that is hard to see will help struggling businesses at the current time.

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The question for the US now becomes — if growth does not return, will foreign capital continue to flow toward the US markets, or will foreign capital slow its pace of investment? Without even contemplating what would happen if capital starts to withdraw for US markets, even a mere slowing in the flow of foreign capital could easily send US interest rates sharply higher, and if the US economy can not turn the corner now with record low rates, then what will happen once the entire yield curve begins to shift upward across the maturity spectrum? In my view, a funding crisis could well be the next major event, characterized by a weakening Dollar and surging US interest rates, forcing Uncle Sam to issue even more debt as the rate of interest on debt rolling over continues to soar. By comparison to the recent crisis seen in 2008, a funding crisis that questions the quality of U.S. government debt will make everything that came before it look like child’s play with huge additional downside risks to both Real Estate and Equity markets. For now, the sun is still shining on the equity markets, but at these levels the equity markets are fully priced for a reasonable recovery, and if the months ahead show more dismal news and an economic relapse, then the equity markets could come under fire all over again. For now, conservative investors should be in a defensive posture and should only be looking to perhaps trade into the market on a set of major oversold conditions, conditions which at the present time have yet to be seen.

…our ‘leadership’ becomes.

GOP’s Coleman concedes, sending Franken to Senate

Al Franken in the Senate. I already thought they were a bunch of clowns. This just confirms it.

Call it what you’d like: a lack of momentum, a trading range, sideways chop. The S&P hasn’t gone anywhere in eight weeks.

Amongst the groups, defense, chemicals and energy still look vulnerable:

Charts courtesy of StockCharts.com

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz. I sure do hate these holiday trading weeks.

The market made its move in the morning, and then shut down at lunch for the remainder of the day. Well, and worked its way a little higher into the close, but by now, that goes without saying.

Internals were negative, and volume was up a bit from yesterday. Advances/declines were about 8 to 11 on both exchanges, with up/down volume 3 to 7 on the NYSE and 2 to 3 on the Nasdaq. New highs/lows were 27/4 on the NYSE and 31/4 on the Nasdaq.

Leaders — Paper (+4.04%), REITs (+0.64%), Comp. Hardware (+0.50%), Disk Drives (+0.38%), Semis (+0.09%), Software (-0.03%), Defense (-0.05%), Insurance (-0.06%)
Laggards — Gold/Silver (-3.22%), Hospitals (-2.39%), Metals (-2.24%), Steel (-1.87%), Airlines (-1.56%), Oil Services (-1.47%), Banks (-1.46%), Commodities (-1.35%)

Treasury Yields — 6-Month: .35%,  2-Year: 1.11%,  5-Year: 2.54%,  10-Year: 3.52%,  30-Year: 4.32%

Energy Prices — Crude oil: $69.89/barrel,  Gasoline: $1.8972/gallon,  Natural Gas: $3.835/mmBTU

US Dollar Index — 80.126

Precious Metals — Gold: $926.90/ounce,  Silver: $13.51/ounce,  Platinum: $1175.00/ounce

BMB Note:   I’ll be glad when this week is over. At least I think I will be.

As if there was any in the first place…

So much for any hopes of knowing any more of what’s going on in the markets anymore, and who’s behind it.

As ZH puts it:

In an information memorandum released on June 24 (09-31), the NYSE Regulation team has announced the Decommissioning of the Daily Program Trading Report (DPTR).

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Basically this is the beginning of the end of unmodified data transparency. Going forward the NYSE will provide whatever data it feels comfortable, after sufficient internal “audits,” and media outlets such as Zero Hedge, which had presented its millions of readers the only data point about Goldman’s complete encroachment of not only NYSE but Program Trading, will be henceforth unreliable and likely will present no useful information at all.

This is a travesty, as well as a complete obliteration and a mockery of the move for transparency that the Administration, Regulators and Exchanges have been posturing they support.

Make sure that the big players in the casino — the ones that are there to do the gov’ts bidding and fleece the little guys along the way — are able to stay behind the two-way mirror, and cannot be seen.

It’s getting to be time for us little people to just give up and walk away — and let the big guys just trade amongst themselves.

Update:   The NYSE responds.

Prime mortgage delinquencies more than double YOY.

Consumer confidence slips, surprising all the ‘green shooters’.

Home prices drop 18 percent YOY. But ‘less bad’ is the new ‘good’:

There is a clear trend home prices declines are moderating — another sign the beleaguered housing market is stabilizing, according to data released Tuesday.

While the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index of 20 major cities tumbled by 18.1 percent, it marked the third straight month the decline was not a record. And yearly losses in 13 metros improved compared to March.

So an 18 percent decline is a sign of stabilization. That’s news to me. Here’s that old psychology/sentiment thing again. When home prices were first declining at an 18 percent rate, the world was ending. Now that they’re declining at only 18 percent, down from a 19 percent record (in a data series that’s less than 10 years old), people are cheering.

Not much earth-shattering stuff out there from what I can tell. Maybe you guys can dig up something interesting.

Here’s an open thread for submissions, and anything else that’s on your mind.

There ain’t no way the recession is over — if Dennis Kneale is saying it is.

From Peter Navarro:

Short Takes

1. Last week’s attempt to deify Fed chairman Ben Bernanke turn my stomach. From the pundits and politicians to sages like Warren Buffett, what all of these Bernanke apologists forget is that whatever steps Bernanke might’ve taken to “get us out of the mess,” Bernanke had a huge role to play in getting us into the mess to begin with. His easy money policies helped fuel a housing bubble at the same time that these policies debased the dollar and killed the European economy and ultimately harmed our export growth. At a critical time, Bernanke ironically was also slow to cut interest rates as the 2007 recession neared.

2. While Bernanke should be fired, there’s no way in hell Larry Summers should be his replacement. Any damn fool or defrocked Harvard president can spend his way out of an economic crisis but it takes a calm clear head to resist that siren song and Summers is incapable of that. That’s why my vote would go to Martin Feldstein — Summers’ onetime mentor and one of the few people who might be able to lead us back to the promised land of prosperity.

3. To my good friends in pundit land, when you’re talking about how the American savings rate is rapidly rising, please remember that the savings rate is a bogus statistic. It only includes wage income. When savings rates were “low” during both the housing and tech bubbles, people were making capital gains hand over fist so that their effective savings rate was actually probably higher.

4. “Cap and Trade” is flat out stupid. If you legitimately want to address the carbon issue, the best way to do it is with a carbon tax that also includes a carbon tax on any goods imported into the United States. By taxing imports into the US, you solve the problem of China and India not wanting to play the global warming solution game.

And yes, any solution to the global warming problem will raise the price of fuel and electricity in every kind of energy we use. If global warming is real, the cost of solving that problem will be a reduction in the income levels and lifestyles of everybody that lives on the planet. Ergo, we have a big decision to make.

Using current economic conditions as an excuse not to make that decision is almost as bad as implementing a “cap and trade policy” that won’t reduce emissions and will simply line the pockets of whoever is smart enough to game the system. This is just one more chapter in the “Obama promised us smarter government that seems to be incapable of delivering it” book.

A piece running in Rolling Stone magazine — “From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression – and they’re about to do it again”

A rather curious day for stocks today. An early dip was quickly bought up, of course. But while the Dow was up in the neighborhood of one percent much of the day, the Russell never got into the green at all, and the Nasdaq A/D line finished in the red.

Internals were mixed, volume was very light. Advances/declines were 3 to 2 on the NYSE but a negative 4 to 5 on the Nasdaq, with up/down volume 2 to 1 on the NYSE and 5 to 3 on the Nasdaq. New highs/lows were 26/5 on the NYSE and 58/7 on the Nasdaq.

Leaders — Paper (+2.48%), Banks (+1.59%), Oil (+1.54%), Homebuilders (+1.45%), Chemicals (+1.30%), Utilities (+1.14%), Hospitals (+1.00%), Drugs (+0.89%)
Laggards — HMOs (-0.68%), Disk Drives (-0.46%), Airlines (-0.17%), Gold/Silver (-0.11%), Metals (-0.08%), Defense (-0.05%), Semis (-0.05%), Internet (-0.05%)

Treasury Yields — 6-Month: .34%,  2-Year: 1.10%,  5-Year: 2.52%,  10-Year: 3.49%,  30-Year: 4.30%

Energy Prices — Crude oil: $71.49/barrel,  Gasoline: $1.9358/gallon,  Natural Gas: $3.944/mmBTU

US Dollar Index — 79.857

Precious Metals — Gold: $937.20/ounce,  Silver: $13.81/ounce,  Platinum: $1183.00/ounce

BMB Note:  
Let’s just say it was a strange day. But what do you expect? Tomorrow’s end of month/quarter/half, and it’s a short holiday week. On top of that, we get the big monthly jobs report released on Thursday morning, when most traders will be headed out on vacation. Maybe there’s a reason for that.

According to MW:

A federal judge on Monday sentenced admitted multi-billion dollar swindler Bernard Madoff to 150 years in prison, according to published reports. Madoff’s lawyers had sought a sentence of 12 years. In March, Madoff pleaded guilty to 11 felony charges, including securities fraud, money laundering, and theft from an employee-benefit plan. His clients have reportedly lost more than $13 billion.

And you gotta love this comment:

“If Madoff received 150 years for a $13 billion fraud scheme, then how many years will Paulson get for extorting $700 billion from the American taxpayer?”

“Stimulate” until things get precarious again. That’s the way governments and central banks operate.

From naked capitalism, Chinese Banks: “An Accident Waiting to Happen”:

Readers may recall that it wasn’t all that long ago that China’s banks were sitting on big losses and the analysts debated how bad the mess was. In 2003, for instance, the damage was pegged at $500 billion, a stunning figure given the size of the economy, and meant the banking system was insolvent.

Even though the Western press has gotten excited about Chinese loan growth, seeing it as a sign of imminent recovery, appearances are deceiving. First, the government set targets, so loans had to be made, whether they made sense or not. Michael Pettis has reported some transactions were shams to meet the mandated goals. About 1/3 of the proceeds were estimated to go to the stock market, hardly a productive use. And the banking aurhorities themselves were recently reported to be trying to curtail loan growth, a confusing signal.

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is even more dour, thanks to the reading a less than cheery reports from Fitch:

China’s banks are veering out of control. The half-reformed economy of the People’s Republic cannot absorb the $1,000bn (£600bn) blitz of new lending issued since December.

Money is leaking instead into Shanghai’s stock casino, or being used to keep bankrupt builders on life support. It is doing very little to help lift the world economy out of slump.

Fitch Ratings has been warning for some time that China’s lenders are wading into dangerous waters, but its latest report is even grimmer than bears had suspected….

“Future losses on stimulus could turn out to be larger than expected, and it is unclear what share the central and/or local governments ultimately will be willing or able to bear.”

Notes on the latest moves in the industry groups:

• We’re close enough to the end of the quarter, let’s stick the YTD numbers in the table.
• Not a lot new this week. The health care stocks continue to show just a bit more life then they had been showing.
• The commodities remain in pullback, with the energies and chemicals looking particularly vulnerable at the moment.
• See them all if you’d like: set #1 — set #2 — set #3 — set #4.
• For a more detailed breakdown of group movement over various time periods, try Prophet.net’s Industry Rankings page., the Industry Group Tracker at WSJ Online, or the industry group tools at Finviz.com.

An interesting discussion yesterday over at Zero Hedge, following up an opening comment from a supposed SEC employee:

The problem with attempting to push a market manipulation case is that it is very difficult to make such a case in a court of law with just the tape alone; intent has to be proven, which virtually requires e-mails or phone call logs, and what do you think the chances are of traders leaving a clear record of market manipulation in their e-mails? But I have doubts as to how much of this activity is overtly coordinated. Anybody who has traded the markets knows how traders get to know the patterns of other traders, even to the point of anticipating their actions; and silent coordination is a very real possibility, but nearly impossible to prove. But if you feel like you’re being taken advantage of because there are market participants with far more money than you who can move the market against you at their will, all I have to say is: welcome to the free markets.

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I realize that there’s a lot of anger over market manipulation, but the SEC can’t just dump fines on people because they think they aren’t being nice to other market participants. The law is very clear on what constitutes a violation, and cases don’t stick unless there is solid evidence. The current participants have very effective policies for staying within the gray areas without stepping into the black, and they have very good lawyers, and they have very experienced personnel who know exactly what they can get away with. If you want to grab a prop desk trader from a major firm who bought options before a news announcement and try and push an insider trading case against him, all I’ve got to say is: good luck, you’re going to need it. Unless you’re lucky enough to get an e-mail with his name and the name of a company insider on it, it’s not likely the case will even make it to trial.

Ok, I get it. It’s very difficult to prove any of these manipulation or insider trading cases unless you have hard evidence, so we don’t bother to try. Which means the problem will just get worse and worse as traders become emboldened by the lack of even a threat of any oversight whatsoever.

I found some of the follow-up comments from other readers quite entertaining — and they make a good point: If the SEC isn’t ever going to go after anybody, why do we have them?

From “FischerBlack”:

So, okay, let me sum up what we know so far:

When it comes to catching Ponzi schemers, you’re useless.
When it comes to catching manipulators, you’re useless unless the manipulation is so obvious a ten-year-old can see it (i.e., you’re useless).
When it comes to catching insider traders, you’re useless unless the insider trading is so obvious a ten-year-old can see it (i.e., you’re useless).

Bottom-line, you’re useless.

But we already knew that, it’s just refreshing to see you admit it. You’re making excuses for why it’s haaaaaard to catch bad guys. And they’re the same excuses you always make. What do we pay you for? To build your resume before landing that seven-figure compliance job at GS?

And from “Trader Steve”:

As someone who worked in the markets on the floor for 25 years I can only say that your organization (not you) stinks.

Relative to the amounts traded I saw theft that was so blatantly plain that RICO could easily have been shown. Let me make a list of who was contacted and who didn’t care:

1- SEC
2- CFTC
3- Division of Enforcement CFTC
4- All heads of CFTC
5- Office of the Chairman of the SEC
6- Manhattan DA
7- Congressman at the time (Nadler?)
8 – FBI…although they did say if I wore a wire and got the proof they might pursue. Sorry, I like breathing.

All are like cancer doctors…they can’t cure and they can’t kill. So in the final analysis, what good are you? You’re good for nothing but catching a secretary do an insider trade for $5,000. Self-regulation stinks. But when it is void from the government what do we have? We have oligacrchs that go further, and further, and further in their theft and they never stop until the market is closed or ruined. We get an occasional show trial.

Congratulations…you collect a check at least and will have your job during a depression. At least you can help your own families while the public is fleeced. For the rest of Americans your office is worse than useless as your ommission fosters the fraud. God forbid you should actually pursue a case like this one.

Lost in all the noise of the big move on Thursday was the fact that there was a big move down on Monday, and that left the Sector SPDRs split on the week, with only the lagging health care and utility stocks posting gains of more than a percent.

The sector picture is changing just ever so slightly. Only 5 of the sector SPDRs are now above their 50-day moving averages (red line), and some of those just barely:

The industrials, materials, energies and discretionaries pulled back and bounced — some of those are now looking more like shorts than longs:

The numbers as we look to close out the first half of the year:

Charts courtesy of StockCharts.com

What would a Friday be without a Georgia bank failure??

Community Bank of West Georgia, Villa Rica, GA

Or maybe two?

Neighborhood Community Bank, Newnan, GA

Let’s double down on those two:
Metro Pacific Bank, Irvine, CA
Horizon Bank, Pine City, MN

Update 6/27:
And then let’s sneak in a fifth one when no one is looking:
Mirae Bank, Los Angeles, CA

I do believe that brings the grand total for the year to 45. Forty-five bank failures in 6 months.

I still don’t think this kind of stuff normally happens at big bear market bottoms:

Charts courtesy of StockCharts.com

A messy, choppy day, but the indices refused to give up any of yesterday’s gains as we head into the end of the quarter, and move past that Russell rebalancing.

Internals were positive again, with volume fairly sluggish all day, but the final numbers will probably be huge with the reshuffling going on. Advances/declines were 3 to 2 on the NYSE and 20 to 11 on the Nasdaq, with up/down volume just better than flat on the NYSE and 11 to 9 on the Nasdaq. New highs/lows were 32/1 on the NYSE and 93/9 on the Nasdaq.

Leaders — Comp. Hardware (+2.45%), Disk Drives (+2.16%), HMOs (+1.64%), Internet (+1.00%), REITs (+0.89%), Biotechs (+0.79%), Broker Dealers (+0.62%), Steel (+0.58%)
Laggards — Paper (-2.32%), Gold/Silver (-1.59%), Homebuilders (-1.26%), Natural Gas (-0.87%), Metals (-0.73%), Oil (-0.68%), Utilities (-0.57%), Commodities (-0.56%)

Treasury Yields — 6-Month: .29%,  2-Year: 1.10%,  5-Year: 2.53%,  10-Year: 3.51%,  30-Year: 4.30%

Energy Prices — Crude oil: $69.16/barrel,  Gasoline: $1.8741/gallon,  Natural Gas: $3.949/mmBTU

US Dollar Index — 79.822

Precious Metals — Gold: $939.40/ounce,  Silver: $14.08/ounce,  Platinum: $1199.00/ounce

BMB Note:  
I wouldn’t say that today’s action helped clear up even the near-term picture any. While the last couple of days may have looked like a good recovery after Monday’s selling, I can’t ignore the fact that there are a large number of ‘first-thrust’ type setups showing up on the short side. Unless those charts repair themselves, this market remains questionable.

Only two days of trading left in June, and we’ve got a short week next week. Then, we start running into earnings season again in another couple of weeks. Geez, time sure flies when you’re having fun.

… is the ‘monster’ Russell rebalancing (today).

The King Report has the story on yesterday’s rally:

Despite an unexpected increase in both Initial Jobless Claims and Continuing Claims stocks, bonds and commodities soared on Thursday…Please note that Street shills and their fin media accomplices tout a single decline in either jobless claim component as a sign that the bottom is in and recovery has commenced. But when jobless claims decline, it’s immaterial…Last week’s claims were revised higher.

Incredibly some media outlets and pundits attributed the rally to relief that Bernanke’s testimony didn’t go badly. HUH!!! Where are the adult editors and managers?

The best explanation for Thursday’s ‘everything’ rally is Q2 performance gaming has commenced. Stocks rallied for, wise guys front ran, the monster Russell rebalancing for Q2…Bonds rallied, just as they have been doing, after the last Treasury auction tranche.

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This is what Easy Al and Ben have been papering over – declining jobs, wages, US real living standards, the massive transfer of wealth to BRICs and OPEC. Q1 GDP was revised to -5.5% due to minor revisions in inventories and trade. The 37.3% decline in business investment and inventories is a record (data series began in 1947). The 38.8% decline in homebuilding is the largest contraction since 1980.

John Williams notes: On July 31st, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) will revamp GDP history going back to 1929…GDP reporting remains virtually worthless and is little more than political propaganda. John notes that income contracted more in Q1 than Q2. GDI is the income-side equivalent of the GDP’s consumption estimate. As estimated in last month’s reporting, reflecting a sharp reversal in “statistical discrepancy,” first-quarter GDI was reported showing an annualized real quarterly contraction of 3.64%, versus a fourth-quarter estimated contraction of 7.78%. Today’s reporting and revision reflected something of a reversal in other trends, showing a deeper 4.31% annualized quarterly contraction in the first quarter. Year-to-year, first-quarter GDI declined by 3.11% (previously down 2.94%), versus a 2.16% contraction in the fourth quarter.

Ben played the ‘I don’t recollect’ card yesterday when asked about an email that claimed Ben told a Fed employee that if BAC played the MAC (materially adverse clause) ‘management would be gone’.

Moments later Ben played the ‘I don’t remember’ gambit. Congressman Dan Burton rebuked Ben, saying his experience in investigations leads him to believe that people say ‘I don’t remember’ to avoid perjury.

…is Jack McHugh:

…another unseemly aspect of today’s proceedings lies in just who in the administration leaked the BAC-MER documents to Congress. The prime suspect, who — of course — will have left no fingerprints, is none other than the man who covets Mr. Bernanke’s job. I am speaking of Larry Summers, and if he somehow convinces President Obama to ditch Mr. Bernanke when the current Chairman’s term expires next year, it will be a disaster. Not because I revere Helicopter Ben, mind you, nor because I have a problem with Mr. Summer’s political party. I would shed no tears if Mr. Bernanke were suddenly replaced by a tough, hard money advocate like Paul Volcker (see the fascinating article about this man of character below), but though they share the same party affiliation, Mr. Summers is Mr. Volcker’s polar opposite.

Summers contributed to the current crack up when he championed the abolition of Glass-Steagall while working for President Clinton, and he also pushed for the law that banned the regulation of the very credit derivatives that have wrought so much damage during these past 24 months. In addition to being “part of the problem” that brought us here, Mr. Summers is an active member of the current administration, one who helps set economic policy for the President. I can think of no other potential appointee who would be viewed as a greater risk to the Fed’s independence than Mr. Summers. It’s a prospect that would not sit well with investors, especially our global creditors. Why else would Warren Buffett offer the glowing endorsement he gave Chairman Bernanke yesterday? As someone who knows well the dynamics in the current administration, the Oracle of Omaha knows full well who Mr. Obama would call upon as the next Fed Chair. The risk such a fate might befall Mr. Bernanke in the wake of today’s hearing is why market participants were nervous this morning. His swift dispatch with the proceedings helped both stocks and bonds soar this afternoon.

Again, my beef with Mr. Summers isn’t personal, nor is it political; it is one grounded in ideological common sense. If we are going to have a central bank in this country, it needs to have the independence we preach about to the rest of the world. Thus, while Bernanke dodged a bullet today, the markets rightly fear there is still one out there with his name on it. It may never happen, but if Summers some day replaces Bernanke, investors will likely react by selling bonds and buying precious metals. In the eyes of investors at least, we might as well just mail the keys of the Eccles building to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Here’s a link to the Volcker article mentioned above. If you want to know more about Volcker, who he is and where he came from, check it out.

So says the new Bank United CEO (via Calculated Risk):

Q: You’ve said in some cases what appears to be a green shoot might actually end up being moss – moss growing on a rock …

Kanas: Actually what I said is I hope it’s not mold growing on a stagnant economy. But frankly I understand that there are – I hate the term green shoots, and we all talk about it every day – but I don’t see it that much. I’m on main street every day, and I’m in a lot of different markets – I’m in New York half the week, and Florida half the week, and were dealing with thousands of people and hundreds of businesses every day and there are very limited green shoots from my perspective.

The bookends from tonight’s market observation by Danielle Park at Financial Sense:

This week the risk trade continues to be under attack with the US dollar strengthening against other more emerging economies. As I have pointed out a few times in the past couple of months, the over-exuberance in emerging markets, commodities and their currencies, has been primarily speculation against the US dollar and not in response to increasing global demand or economic expansion. These sentiment driven speculations can be wild and reckless; capital protective strategies are needed.

—

The stock and commodity markets seem ripe for a reality check in the weeks ahead. Price risk measures high once again.

	The S&P — is it consolidating… or topping? The indicators disagree…
	The VIX has been pushed back down to the point from which it has bounced back up twice already, but it has yet to turn higher — still a bullish indication.
	But put/call ratios have clearly turned higher over the past couple of weeks, which is a bearish indication.

Charts courtesy of StockCharts.com

The war over the 50-day rages on, with the bulls winning today’s battle by taking the market on a mid-morning romp and then holding most of those gains for the rest of the day. A late slump threatened to give some back, but that was bought back up in the final 10 minutes.

The Transports were the big winners, helped by a bounce in the badly lagging airlines. Now that I think about it, a lot of recent laggards bounced today — housing, retail, metals, energies.

Internals were clearly positive, with volume just a bit heavier than yesterday. Advances/declines were 4 to 1 on both exchanges, with up/down volume almost 9 to 1 on the NYSE and 7 to 1 on the Nasdaq. New highs/lows were 15/7 on the NYSE and 37/6 on the Nasdaq.

Lots of green in the groups:
Leaders — Airlines (+6.47%), Homebuilders (+5.12%), Metals (+4.58%), Gold/Silver (+4.10%), Hospitals (+4.04%), Retailers (+3.76%), Oil Services (+3.57%), Transport (+3.47%)
Laggards — Defense (-0.20%), Disk Drives (+0.70%), Comp. Hardware (+1.28%), Drugs (+1.43%), Software (+1.46%), REITs (+1.49%), Insurance (+1.64%), Utilities (+1.69%)

Treasury Yields — 6-Month: .28%,  2-Year: 1.11%,  5-Year: 2.57%,  10-Year: 3.53%,  30-Year: 4.32%

Energy Prices — Crude oil: $70.23/barrel,  Gasoline: $1.8983/gallon,  Natural Gas: $3.844/mmBTU

US Dollar Index — 80.370

Precious Metals — Gold: $939.20/ounce,  Silver: $13.99/ounce,  Platinum: $1185.00/ounce

BMB Note:  
Not much in the way of comments. A bit of a bounce into the end of the quarter certainly isn’t unexpected. But the indices have merely gained back Monday’s losses at this point. They’re still rangebound and dancing around the 50-day, with the shorter-term averages starting to curl down. We’ve already looked at the various breakdowns in the groups over the past week or so, and right now, those areas are just bouncing back up.

Stay tuned. This show never ends.